


The Sick Baby

by 3ss3nc3



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Road Trip, F/M, Fluff, Fluffy oneshot, Rey Needs A Hug, Soft Ben Solo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:41:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24190729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3ss3nc3/pseuds/3ss3nc3
Summary: *Inspired By A True Story*Rey is travelling through Arizona, and she doesn’t feel well. She stops at a gas station to buy cold medicine and ends up buying a cute toy as well. As a result, the cashier thinks Rey has a sick baby. Rey has to bluff her way through a parenting conversation, all with a certain tall dark-haired man listening and enjoying the situation.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 3
Kudos: 58





	The Sick Baby

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by the true story of a friend on my online support group. :)  
> (Minus the Reylo element, of course.)

It had been another long day.  
The open road wasn’t the most forgiving place, regardless of where you came from—or where you were headed.  
Rey was running.  
She couldn’t really describe why; it was more an apathetic verb than a valid cause, and she refused to answer any queries beyond that regarding her destination or origins.  
The sun had long set, Rey’s air conditioning in her car was broken again, and the humidity of a summer evening in Arizona coalesced into pools of utter discomfort on Rey’s face, hair, and body. Worst of all, she had started to develop a terrible head cold that made the heat unbearable.  
She peered at herself wearily in her mirrors, grimacing at the sight of her travel-worn face.  
“Time to stop,” she told herself.  
Glancing at her GPS, she saw that there was a small town coming up in five kilometres. Rey chugged the last of the tepid water from her bottle and drove a little faster, eager for a cold drink, a good meal, and a soft bed.  
And her car desperately needed gas.  
Rey felt a worm of fear inching down her spine. Would she have enough to make it?  
She hadn’t realized that, for the last 30 kilometers, she’d nearly been running on empty.  
Rey swallowed and kept going.  
She pulled into a gas station on the outskirts of the little town just as her car began to sputter. Turning off the ignition, Rey opened her door and stretched wearily.  
“Hey, need some gas?” a young attendant asked, coming up to her.  
Rey was in a bad enough mood to say something sharp back, like, “no, I just pulled up to the pump just because”, but she also was too tired to care. She just nodded at the boy.  
“Fill her up with regular, please,” she said, a little stuffy from the head cold. She needed medicine for that if she was going to be able to sleep.  
The boy nodded and set to it.  
Rey went inside, relishing the ounce of pleasure at the cool burst of cool air as she walked in.  
The station was quiet, affording Rey the opportunity to browse the shelves of various tantalizing goodies.  
She nearly grabbed up several bags of chips and chocolate, then saw the racks of aspirin and cold medicine and remembered. She reluctantly bypasses the tempting snacks and selected a bottle of Tylenol and a few boxes of cold medicine.  
She was almost at the counter when she saw the most beautiful thing.  
Rey hadn’t had very many toys and things of her own growing up, as her foster families didn’t care about her happiness, and this was the most beautiful thing she’d seen in a long time.  
She grabbed the shiny yellow object, and it burst into colorful pulses of light.  
A light-up banana. How marvellous.  
Rey couldn’t contain the giggle that rose in her. She took it, along with her medicine, to the counter and laid them down to be scanned.  
There were two employees behind the counter, one giving her a polite smile and the other leaning against the counter, his face passive and relaxed. He was enjoying a cup of what appeared to be coffee, the paper cup dwarfed by his large hands.  
He looked up and caught her staring. Rey turned her attention back to her treasure, the banana held carefully in the other employee’s hand.  
“Aww, gotta sick little one?” the cashier asked conversationally, having scanned the toy and moving on to the cold medicine.  
Rey blinked, confused.  
The cashier smiled, gesturing first to the medicine, then to the banana.  
Rey blushed, a little embarrassed at her childish purchase.  
“Yes,” she blurted, not really thinking it through.  
The man with the coffee looked at her, a twinkle of—was that humor?—in his eyes.  
“That’s too bad,” the cashier cooed. “How old is your baby?” she asked.  
“Um, he—she’s...three months old.” Rey stammered, trying to come up with a satisfactory answer.  
The cashier looked at her, concerned.  
“That’s awfully young. What’s her name?”  
Rey felt her palms begin to sweat. What the hell was going on? Since when had gas station cashiers thought it was any of their business to ask questions like this?  
“Uh, her name is...Kate. Katie. Well, her name is Katherine but we call her...lots of things,” Rey managed.  
She heard a small noise from the man behind the counter.  
He’d lowered the cup from his lips and was looking at her again, this time with a hint of a smile on his face.  
He thinks—no, he knows—I’m lying, Rey thought.  
He made no move to spare her from her own mouth by calling her bluff or interrupting the cashier, who was now going into irritating detail about her own babies, describing every cough her little ones had.  
“...I usually just give them a bottle, but when they’re all stuffy, poor things, they can’t eat and breathe at the same time. So what I do…”  
The employee’s voice faded into the background as the man began to silently mock her, mouthing along and rolling his eyes.  
Rey found herself holding back laughter, her misery and exhaustion momentarily forgotten.  
The man was funny.  
And rather good-looking, too.  
Rey blushed again, and was snapped out of her reverie by the employee asking her a question.  
“Sorry?” Rey said, out of it.  
“Oh, I just asked what you usually do when your baby is sick,” the cashier asked, her hands, immobile, still holding the scanner and the medicine.  
“Um, not much. She’s usually...just really tired, I guess? Sleeps all day.” Rey explained, completely blowing smoke.  
The cashier looked disappointed. “You know, letting her ‘just sleep’? That’s not really responsible parenting…” she admonished, looking at Rey with a frown.  
Rey was about to tell her off when she saw the man, almost folded double, holding his sides in silent amusement, his face split with the most radiant smile Rey had ever seen from another human being. He was so tall his hunched form seemed to take up the whole space behind the counter, and his coffee cup was crushed in one hand, apparently forgotten.  
She opened her mouth, then closed it. Then opened it again.  
Feeling quite like a fish out of water, Rey just shook her head and turned to the cashier.  
“I’m quite busy with work all day, my...mother—in-law usually looks after Kath, uh, Katie. Kate.”  
That must have been the last straw, because the man burst into audible laughter, the jubilant sounds echoing off the walls.  
Rey couldn’t help but smile herself. While the cashier looked on in utter confusion, Rey and the man behind the counter shared the joke, her face eventually replicating his enjoyment of the situation.  
“Ben! What’s so funny?” the cashier sniffed, offended.  
“Nothing, Rose. You might want to finish ringing up this woman here, I’m sure she’d like to go um, look after her baby,” he said, with an almost imperceptible wink at Rey.  
 _Ben_.  
That was his name.  
Rey smiled at the cashier, who apologetically finished ringing up Rey’s items, as well as the gas, and Rey paid.  
She waved goodbye at the man—Ben, she corrected herself—who waved back.  
She left, feeling a slight pang.

A pity she’d never see that man again.

Rey had almost reached her car when she heard a shout behind her.  
“Wait!”  
Ben ran out of the building, breathless and still grinning.  
“I’m sorry about that,” he said, not looking sorry at all.  
Rey smiled back at him.  
“S’okay,” she murmured, fully aware of her bedraggled state.  
Ben shrugged. “No, Rose is not okay. She talks like that to everyone. It’s a bad habit, the old gossip.”  
Rey chuckled.  
They stood in companionable silence for a moment, neither willing to leave first.  
“Well,” Rey said reluctantly, hating to break the mood, “I’ve gotta…”  
Ben looked horrified for a second.  
“You don’t actually have a sick baby, do you? Shit, ‘cause the way you were answering, I thought—”  
Rey made a quick, negative gesture. “No, no, no, of course not. I’m not even married. I mean, I know you don’t have to be married to have a kid, I just meant...you know.”  
Aware that she was babbling, Rey stopped.  
Ben just looked at her, with that smile, like she hung the moon or some such nonsense.  
“Sorry,” Rey said quietly.  
“Don’t be, it’s fine.” Ben held out his hand. “I’m Ben,” he said gravely, evidently wanting a proper introduction.  
Rey took it. “Rey Pa—Rey,” she replied.  
“Well, Rey-Pa-Rey,” Ben said, that same damned twinkle in his eye, “just passing through?”  
Rey glanced down the road from whence she came, thinking of what she was running from.

“No,” she said, smiling up at Ben, “I think I’ll stay a while.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> I’m @emma_reylo on Twitter, come say hi!


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